Kate Winslet rails against male executives who ‘patronised’ her while she was raising money for new war drama

Kate Winslet has spoken about being “patronised” by male executives when trying to raise funds for her new war biopic, Lee.

The 47-year-old British actor leads director Ellen Kuras’s drama as photojournalist Lee Miller in an adaptation of Antony Penrose’s 1985 biography, The Lives of Lee Miller.

It will tell “the story of photographer Elizabeth ‘Lee’ Miller, a fashion model who became an acclaimed war correspondent for Vogue magazine during World War II,” according to IMDb.

Before the film’s recent world premiere on Saturday (9 September) at the Toronto International Film Festival, Winslet told Vogue about the “unbelievably outraging” process of getting the film financed.

“The men who think you want and need their help are unbelievably outraging,” the Titanic star said about the “patronising” meetings she had with executives.

“I’ve even had a director say to me: ‘Listen, you do my film and I’ll get your little Lee funded…’ Little!” Winslet recalled. “Or we’d have potential male investors saying things like: ‘Tell me, why am I supposed to like this woman?’”

While she acknowledged that attitudes towards women in the film and TV industry are changing, she also pointed out the progress that had been made thanks, in part, to the #MeToo movement.

“Oh, my God! This is the best part. Young actresses now – f*** me – they are unafraid. It makes me so proud,” Winslet said.

“And I think, Yes, all the s*** flinging, all the struggle, all the using my voice for years, often being finger-​pointed at and laughed at – I don’t give a s***!” she added.

“It was all bloody worth it. Because the culture is changing in the way that I couldn’t in my wildest dreams have imagined in my twenties.”

Just last week, Los Angeles prosecutors sentenced That ‘70s Show star Danny Masterson, 47, to 30 years to life in prison for raping two women two decades ago.

Meanwhile, vulgar comments made by his former co-star Ashton Kutcher about Hilary Duff and the Olsen twins have resurfaced as Kutcher and his wife Mila Kunis face backlash for writing letters of support for Masterson.

Lee also features Andy Samberg, Marion Cotillard, Jude Law, Alexander Skarsgård, Andrea Riseborough and Noémie Merlant. It will be distributed by Sky Cinema in the UK – it does not yet have a release date.

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